Geneva to pay for emergency repair of electric lines

GENEVA – Aldermen approved an emergency expenditure Monday of $23,154 to rebuild an electric line over the Fox River at Ford Street.

The labor contract was awarded to InTren of Union.

"We'll start it as soon as they can get crews down here," said Manager of Electric Operations Hal Wright.

Wright said the rebuilding project was prompted by high winds occurring March 31, which caused power to blink on and off.

"We had a windstorm that caused some of the lines to blow together and damaged a couple of those wires that are across the river," Wright said. "The lines have been there for a very long time. We've rebuilt some of the lines in the crossing in the last year, but not all of them. So at his point, we're going to do them all."

Instead of an outage, Wright said, customers experienced a series blinks in their electric service.

"The power would come back on and stay on until the wind would blow again and the circuits would time out," Wright said. "If there are enough blinks in a short enough period of time, the circuit will open and stay open – but that never happened."

First Ward Alderman Chuck Brown said the council held a special Committee of the Whole to approve the request right before the regular city council, where final action was taken.

"I understand it's an emergency," Brown said. "We're pushing it through in a single night, which we don't like to do."